I ran across this writeup through my site statistics and noticed a very nice article on several ASP.NET control developers, one of which being me. I'm not exactly sure when or where this was released, but based on the URL, I'm guessing it was released September of 2004. I have to say that this was by far a shock for me, and I'm quite pleased. Not that I'm bragging or anything, but I did get most of the rave in the article. Andy's and Peter's were just side notes, it seemed.

Unleash It 2.1 has reached another milestone with many fixes and few additions. There isn't a ton of functionality change, however you should notice a few differences:

1. If you're modifying the configuration file outside of Unleash It (while its running), you will be notified to reload your profiles.

2. A few options are disabled in the VS.NET addin configuration, due to them not being used in the addin.

3. A faster startup time due to optimization as well as only checking for updates once a day.

So, the changelog is as follows (which can also be found here):

• Optimization of code, now starts faster!
• Upgraded to #ziplib 0.81
• Added ability to duplicate profiles.
• Added notification in the Windows Application when the profiles configuration is changed.
• Fixed destination label oversight.
• Fixed VS.NET plugin now correctly loads the configuration.
• Fixed intermitten problems with testing FTP profile settings.
• Fixed delay of file deployment notification in status bar area.

So, if you're currently using Unleash It, you can check for an update and it'll allow you to download version 2.1, otherwise follow this link to my website to download Unleash It.

Update: It seems as if there are problems if you run the installation while Unleash It is installed and/or running. I would suggest removing it completely first, then downloading it and installing it.

Update 2: I've pulled the installation until I can get this figured out.

Update 3: I've diagnosed the problem, fixed it, and a new build is available for download.

Just read yesterday's Dilbert (not web, but desk calendar)...its truely priceless:

Boss: "My keyboard is broken. It only types asterisks for passwords"
Dogbert (Tech support): "Try changing your password to five asterisks."
Boss: "I hope I can remember it."

Talk about great!

So since I announced the rebranding of WebDeploy to Unleash It, I added a keyword search feed for "unleash it" through NewsGator. I've concluded that there are a lot of blogs out there that use "unleash" quite a bit concerning John Kerry and his campaign. And, after last nights presentation by Dick Cheney, he now appears a multitude of times. Now, I don't really care much for politics, but its quite funny to see "unleash" "unleash" "unleash" come out of so many peoples blogs on politics.

"The day has cometh," sayeth the lone developer responsible for easy web deployments...

Unleash It 2.0 has finally reached its pinnacle of functionality, and as such its in due for a release to the public for general consumption (I'm not responsible for anyone eating software (is this even possible? (maybe if you save it to a floppy disk or CD?))).

For those who are not familiar with Unleash It, it is the rebranded utility named WebDeploy. However, Unleash It is not just a rebranded version, its a completely new codebase that has allowed for a multitude of expansion. Taking ideas (and a bit of code) from WebDeploy, Unleash It 2.0 has all of the same features of WebDeploy, but MORE!

Jumping directly into the changes, rather highlights (how can their be changes from a new codebase?):

• Redesigned Windows Application, allowing you to:
• Deploy a single profile or multiple profiles
• Select folder masks that are to be excluded
• Easy profile switching with new profile combobox
• Easy active profile editing
• Redesigned profile configuration dialog (ditched the wizard)
• Redesigned profile management dialog (easier to use now!)
• Easy to deploy a profile from the notification area icon
• Notification Area Icon now alerts you when your deployment has finished
• NEW! Visual Studio .NET 2003 Add-In
• Easy to configure quick deploy profile
• Easy to deploy a selected project (context menu item in the solution explorer)
• NEW! WebDeploy Profile Conversion
• Allows you to convert your existing WebDeploy profiles into Unleash It 2.0 Format!
• New! New website to provide a primary entry point for Unleash It information.
• New! New forums to discuss Unleash It, submit bugs or feature requests.

So, what are you waiting for? Scootch on over to the Unleash It site and download your free copy today!

Tonight will be like no other. Kent Tegels will be making a trip from Nebraska all the way to central Illinois just to speak on SQL Server 2005. As a part of our attempts of expansion, we will be shifting our our meeting locations to Illinois State University to hopefully grab more of a student base to our group.

So, if your in the Central Illinois area this evening, stop by ISU's campus around 7PM. We will be meeting at CVA 145 (it's the only round building on campus, which happens to be in the middle of construction right now).

See you there!

Just saw from Wally that the VS.NET 2005 September CTP bits are available on MSDN. 16 hours for him, eek! 3-5 hours for me

I just moved my site from my current hoster over to WebHost4Life and my DNS changes look like they're starting to propogate. So, if you notice any quirkiness in the next few days, that is why. Also, its quite possible any forum posts that were entered around the switchover time will be *lost* (actually, they won't be brought over).

Update: Downloading my controls and viewing my forums now works. Sorry to those who attempted to download the controls and couldn't. Thats what you get with a website transition.

So this just purely rocks. Not only will we only have to define it in 1 space, but we get intellisense too? Wow, I can't wait

So I ran into a bit of a speedbump this afternoon while working on Unleash It. I was trying to add menu items to a sub menu of a context menu for the Notify Icon (boy is that a mouthful to say (and also to write)). Well, it seems that there is a bit of a known bug that isn't broadly stated when creating sub-menu items dynamically...and that is that once you've created them, and try to recreate them, they never appear.

So, after a bit of googling, I came across this thread and determined that the easiest hack around this is to set your sub-menu's visibility to false then to true again. This, of course, was much easier than having to recreate the entire context menu, which is the other proposed solution.

So, if you've never ran across this problem before, make a mental note of this if you should ever happen to want to do something so remotely insane as me, or other people out there that do it as well.